Daily Recap and Highlights
Happy Valentine’s day to all of the sturgeon spearing enthusiasts! The sturgeon harvest on Lake Winnebago seems to be heating up, particularly on the north end. There were 37 fish registered today, which is the largest daily harvest since opening day. The Waverly Beach station was busy once again, registering 17 fish. Waverly Beach paced the way with registration numbers yesterday, so it appears that spearers are starting to locate fish in the northern 1/3 of the lake.
Things remained fairly slow on the Upriver Lakes today with a total of 9 fish registered. The relatively low registration number isn’t a surprise given that it was a week day and close to 40% of the license holders have already tagged out for the season. Only 2 of the fish registered today were adult females and the chances of a full 16-day season on the Upriver Lakes increases with each passing day. A breakdown of today’s harvest and season registration numbers by station is available through the following link:
Day 7 Harvest Report.pdf
The largest fish in today’s harvest was 131.9 pounds, 75.4 inches and registered at Waverly Beach by Daniel Hoeper. Daniel’s fish was just tenths of a pound heavier than the 131.6 pound, 72.8 inch fish registered at Waverly Beach by David Meier. The largest fish registered on the Upriver Lakes today was 63.1 pounds, 61.3 inches and registered at Indian Point by Brandon Lamers. Photos of all three fish are included in the right margin.
It appears that spearers on Lake Winnebago are starting to get a bit more dialed in. We are expecting to see an increase in spearing effort during the upcoming weekend. One of our DNR pilots will be conducting aerial shanty counts again tomorrow to see how participation on the 2nd Saturday of the season compares to opening day.
All 10 sturgeon registration stations (7 on Lake Winnebago and 3 on the Upriver Lakes) will be staffed and open for the upcoming weekend. Good luck to all of the spearers that will be heading out for Day 8 of the 2020 sturgeon spearing season! |
